Train of Thought
by GoldFountain
Summary: Hello is simply the beginning of goodbye.


A/N: As the title implies, here is a train of thought. Pardon me if it drags; my own trains of thought tend to do that sometimes. Also, I suggest listening to Hoppipolla by Sigur Ros while reading, like how I did while writing this piece. Works like zen, I promise.

* * *

**Train of Thought**

The Altea train station was dark, empty, and silent. Wind whistled through the silent boarding platform, gas lamps flickered feebly in the darkness, and passengers, porters and conductors alike were out of sight. At 3 A.M., this was the usual fare of the place.

But today was an exception.

There was one passenger on the platform. A man wearing a tweed suit and burberry coat stood hidden beneath the shadow of a pole clock, holding a dirty and ripped up sheet of paper in his hand.

The man had a haggard look on his face, with bags accentuating his strained eyes. He probably woke up in the middle of his sleep, and came to the train in response to a call of some sort of emergency.

The man looked up from his paper to examine at his surroundings. There were traces of people having been around earlier in the day, he noticed. Folded up newspapers were lying forgotten and unread underneath some benches. A fallen ice cream cone lay with its point straight up by a nearby water fountain. The child that likely dropped it probably got a replacement from their loving parents. There was even some uncapped lipstick and a compact mirror lying about, looking as though the woman that was using them had just dropped the items out of her hands by mistake. But that woman was gone. Not a single soul was in sight.

The man blinked and returned gazing at his paper. Seeing the station empty wasn't surprising, but made the man feel rather fettered nevertheless. The fact that there were people here but have since disappeared - it made the place seem like a deserted ghost town.

He glanced at his watch. 3:13. Not too long until the train arrived, he calculated. But waiting was not the man's strong suit, especially in situations when he was alone and bored like this. He tapped his foot on the ground impatiently, despite knowing that his hurry would be all for naught. The train wasn't going to come any sooner either way. That was a bad thing about scheduled services such as trains; you couldn't get a ride on the spur of the moment. But that was what you paid in exchange for guaranteed service, bar the occasional delay.

He had thought about taking other modes of transportation. Finding a horse-drawn carriage or a taxi would be difficult at this hour, but not impossible. The man stuck to trains, however. He disliked waiting, but waiting for naught was an even worse prospect for him. Why play his luck at the waiting game when he could ride the train, which had a clearly defined schedule and was more efficient, to boot?

The man folded up his paper and placed it in his inner suit pocket, careful not to crinkle it any more than it already was. The motion took him but just a few seconds, before he resumed staring blankly at the ground in front of him.

Time simply seemed to feel as though it ticked by slower when you were alone. Thankfully, the pole clock he was standing under did not make a ticking noise as each second passed by. Even the quietest of ticking could have been heard annoyingly throughout the train platform.

The man glanced at his watch again. 3:15. He sighed. The train was late; it should have arrived by now.

The man was forced to do nothing but wait. If there was a delay, then he hoped that it was a short, easily rectified one. He tapped his foot at a quicker pace.

The man glanced above his head at the pole clock. The time was set the same as his watch, though not exactly to the second. He looked away from the time keepers; watching the seconds tick by just made every minute feel that it took even longer.

It would be even worse on the train, however, as the speed you were traveling gave off the illusion that time was flying by when it wasn't. That feeling stung. The man hated illusions like those.

Finally, after a few minutes of brooding silently on some thoughts - thinking was the terrible result of having nothing to do, after all - the man heard the sound of a horn tooting far off in the distance. He looked up and at the tracks, where he could see the bright, singular headlight of the locomotive gleaming brightly in the darkness. The man squinted at the sudden light, and if he inhaled deeply, he could smell the odor of burning coals, even at this distance.

The train rolled up to the station, its propulsion gears grinding slowly to a halt. The man felt the generated wind, which was surprisingly warm, tumble against his frame, whipping the tails of his suit and coat around his body.

Once again, the man looked at his watch for what was probably the twentieth time since he had arrived at the station. 3:20. The train was five minutes late, held up by a maintenance check, probably. The man was glad that the holdup wasn't a caribou crossing or something like that, honestly.

The man slowly walked up to the train, whose horn was still smoking. He stopped at the entrance door, which had opened automatically once the train had came to a halt. He looked around. No ticket conductors were in sight. Was he supposed to just step aboard?

There seemed to be no other choice. The man doubted anyone would step out in this midnight weather. He climbed up the steps and entered the train, coming into contact with a rush of warm air not unlike the wind earlier. The joys and comforts of modern heating were truly blessings.

He was about to take a breath out of relief, only to realize... the train was completely silent. He should have been used to silence by now, but something just felt wrong about the place. The man wondered if he got on the right train. Perhaps this train arrived at 3:20, not because of delays, but because that was the proper arrival time? But there wasn't a train that came at 3:15. What if this was a train that did not go to Corneria? These were strange thoughts, but ones that occurred to him nevertheless. He thought about the brown paper that was in his pocket.

Now this was a problem. He began to walk down the train, hoping to find some confirmation.

The man walked briskly through the hallways, tilting his head from side to side to see through the glass if anyone was inhabiting one of the rooms. He was not expecting much, however. This time of day, during the sleeping hours, trains were particularly empty, even moreso on a slow-cruising passenger train like this. Seeing anyone, even a bearded, kooky old man reading the papers would be a stroke of heaven for him on this specter of a train.

He bit his lip when he noticed he was approaching the end of the carriage, not having seen a single soul. Even the carriage's conductor was away on some order of business, perhaps gone off to take a quick nap.

As the man walked past the last pair of rooms, he turned his head slightly without energy, not having much hope of seeing anyone within these rooms. He took a breath when he saw his dim hopes become relit; a woman was sitting by herself, facing the window, in the very last room he looked into.

The man quickly doubled back to where the woman's carriage was. Apparently, the woman had noticed the sounds of his hurried footsteps, as she was now looking at the man through the door instead of the window.

Her petite mouth was slightly opened. Her blue eyes were quite wide, looking as though they belonged on a little porcelain doll. Whether or not her eyes were naturally that wide, the man did not know. This was their first meeting, after all. The woman tilted her head slightly, and gave him a wavering, delicate smile. One that probably mirrored the surprise expressed in the man's own raised, inquiring eyebrows.

The man put his hand on the door handle and slowly slid the glass open just a crack, so that his voice could creep in.

"Excuse me, ma'am. Do you know if this train heads to Corneria?" the man asked.

"Yes, I do," said the woman, fixing him in place with a perplexed stare.

The man noted that the woman responded immediately and without faltering. Her conviction was certain. That puzzled look she had was not due to a lack of knowledge. He gave her a small, satisfied nod and straightened his posture.

When she saw the man standing in the doorway, waiting for her answer, the woman gestured to the empty seat in front of her and continued, "Please, have a seat."

So while she answered him immediately, she was not going to answer his question in the same way. Curious. The man considered her proposal. Was she inviting him for another purpose than delaying her answer to his question? Or was she simply being courteous, knowing that having gotten onto the train, it will be a while before the next stop?

After a speculative tap of his fingers on the glass, the man shrugged. Muttering "Excuse me," quietly before entering, the man pushed the sliding door wider and stepped inside, taking a seat on the plush booth bench opposite of the female passenger.

The woman smiled gently as he came in. Her eyes followed his movements closely, watching the man smooth out the foldings of his suit before sitting down.

"My name is Georgia "Peach" Toadstool," said the woman, once the man had stopped shifting uncomfortably in his seat and was willing to look at her in the eyes.

Now that he was closer to the woman, the man was able to get a clearer look at the woman's appearance. The man was interested in the person that chose to ride the train at such an odd hour, who looked like a refined young lady of blue blood, no less. She was as much of a mystery as any other woman he faced. She dressed simply in a solid pink dress that had lemon chiffon accents decorating the hems. As far as he could tell, the woman wore no jewelry, save for the two sapphire earrings and the sapphire brooch adorning her chest. A lacy parasol rested on top of a handbag sitting in her lap. Her only other luggage seemed to be the brown suitcase kept hidden under her seat. The man assumed the woman was visiting some relations of some kind, due to her more formal than casual dress and light luggage.

"Ah," said the man flatly, a bit muddled in his thoughts.

In a light and airy voice, the woman asked, "May I ask for your name?"

The man hesitated. Giving his name did not seem needed in answering a question. But seeing how he entered her compartment - he was beginning to doubt his reasons for doing so - it would be required in this intimate sort of situation. Plus, the woman gave him her name, so it would only be polite to give his.

"McCloud. Fawkes McCloud," the man replied.

The woman nodded understandingly.

"A wonderful name," she said.

The woman paused to brush a golden lock of hair from her face, allowing her blue eyes become even more piercing within this confined space. As if to demonstrate the fact, she began to stare at the man, unflinchingly, unblinkingly. The effect was nerve wracking.

"U-Um, ma'am," began the man, fidgeting his fingers and lowering his head upon the startling eye contact. "Would you p-please perhaps answer my question?"

The woman stared at him for a few seconds further, only to suddenly drop her gaze, as though she just realized her staring.

"My apologies," said the woman. "The next stop is Hocotate. Corneria is still quite a bit aways, I'm afraid."

She bit her lip. That's going to leave some lipstick on her teeth. She added hesitantly, "Perhaps I should explain why I invited you to a seat."

The man certainly had this pegged as one of his biggest questions once his inquiry about Corneria was resolved, so he was glad that things were beginning to become clear. He nodded.

"I... I suppose I asked you if you would like to step in, as it will be a bit of time aways before the next stop, and even moreso until we reach Corneria," said the woman.

"Do you know what time this train will arrive at Corneria, then?" the man asked.

The woman shook her head. She said apologetically, "All I know are the order of stops. I do not know the exact times, unfortunately."

"Ah?"

The man assumed the woman was not good with numbers. She didn't look the type to be, but even so, memorizing some times, especially the one of your stop, wasn't that difficult. This brought up another question in his mind.

"Do you know when you're getting off, then...?" asked the man.

"Hm?" the woman said.

She suddenly smiled, showing two rows of glittering white teeth. Her canines were extraordinarily flat, much flatter than his own, the man noticed. At least her smiling expression wasn't nearly as unnerving as her speculating, wide-eyed one, he thought.

"Oh, I don't need to know when," she said, her smile slowly turning into a feeble grin. "Since I'm getting off at the same stop as you."

If the man had been drinking something, he would have choked and spit.

"Corneria? You're also going to Corneria?" spluttered the man, leaning forward.

The woman tilted her head down slightly. She said nothing else and looked out the window out of the corner of her eyes.

The man opened his mouth as if to say something, but stopped once he noticed the woman was fiddling nervously with the handle of her parasol in her lap. He suddenly remembered that if it rained, that parasol laced with holes would be as useless in terms of rain cover as holding a spaghetti strainer above your head would do. All parasols were like that; merely just for show.

The man decided to turn his eyes towards the window. Might as well, since the woman was clearly and clumsily trying to shift - or rather, drop - the subject. Almost too clearly and clumsily, in fact. The man wondered if anything else about the woman was just for show.

Even though it was dark and the sun had not come up yet, the man could see his outside perfectly fine, due to his extraordinarily keen vision. Through the window, the man could see rolling hills and valleys cover the picturesque landscape separated from him by an inch of glass, the sight being marred only by the occasional spotting of small villages nestled between the grooves of the mountains. If he focused his eyes on one spot long enough, he could see each minute and wonderful detail of the targeted scene for a fleeting moment.

After about a minute of silent gazing, the woman couldn't distract herself by looking out the window any further.

Pushing back another lock of golden hair that draped in front of her eyes again, the woman said, "You were also the only person on the train."

The man was caught off guard by her sudden speaking. Shaking his head, the man turned his head back towards her and said:

"Pardon? Me?"

"Yes. That is also another reason why I called - invited you here. I thought you might have been searching for some company," said the woman.

"Not many people ride a train at three in the morning," the man said. "I was thinking that it'd be a blessing if I could run into anyone aboard this empty train, even a fellow passenger would have been nice."

"Yes."

"But..." the man began. "What made you think I was looking for company? I might have been trying to find a conductor."

The woman smiled. She had stopped fiddling with her parasol, now that she had regained her vigor.

"You were going the opposite direction from the engineers' and conductors' rooms," said the woman. "There were only passenger carriages the way you were going. And all the carriage conductors have gone off for a break - not very good conduct from them, if you ask me."

"Ah..." the man said slowly.

The woman was right. For some reason, the man went down the southern end of the train, instead of the north, where he would be more likely to find someone like an official that would be able to tell him the arrival times of each stop. He did it without thinking, and the woman had caught his errant behavior with that little information.

"But why?" the man asked. "Why would I do such a thing?"

"Why?" The woman seemed curious. "Is there a need to know why?"

"Well, I suppose," said the man, shrugging. "Even if knowing doesn't change what happened, I'd still like to know the cause."

"Hm... Maybe you just felt like it? An instinct, if you so will," suggested the woman. "Or, perhaps, you were looking for some company, like I said before. The trains and train stations are awfully vacant at this hour.

"But that may just be wishful thinking on my part," continued the woman, looking down. She had begun fiddling with her parasol in her lap again. She added in a quiet voice, barely louder than a whisper, "Perhaps I was feeling lonely."

The woman blinked in surprise when she saw and felt the warmth of a hand press down on top of hers. She looked up, and saw the man was looking at her with a set of piercing green eyes. She gulped.

"No, you were probably right," the man said clearly. He didn't look as though he had heard that last part of what she said. "It could have been my subconscious..."

The man looked down at his arm, and saw it grasping the woman's hands to prevent them from fiddling. Shocked, he quickly withdrew the contact.

"S-Sorry," said the man, his ears turning red.

The woman didn't seem to mind. She said to him, "No, no, go on."

The man took a small breath to calm his nerves before continuing.

"It could have been my subconscious that led me down here," said the man. "For all intents and purposes that I'm ignorant of."

"That may be the cause. I have read about such a thing in a book about psychology," the woman said. "People sometimes do things subconsciously, which is sometimes referred to as instinct - like I suggested earlier - or premonition by some. You probably came to me by choice, and with reason."

The woman put a hand to her chin, looking lost in thought. The man patiently waited.

"But then, your coming aboard the train..." the woman said, only to trail off.

"You're thinking that it may have also been my subconscious that did that?" the man finished for her.

The woman nodded.

"Yes, yes, I suppose I might have climbed aboard with something in mind. I didn't begin to feel as though something was wrong until I was heading for a seat - which there were plenty of," said the man.

"Perhaps you felt a bit worried upon seeing the train so empty, and that's what caused you to doubt yourself?" said the woman.

"Possibly."

The man had returned to gazing out the window. He tapped his fingers on the windowsill, revealing his impatient side once again. After staring outside for a few moments without absorbing any of the sights, the man turned his glassy-eyed expression onto the woman. She was looking at him earnestly, her shoulders scrunched up as though she was poising for an interview.

"The countryside is charming, isn't it?" the woman said, twinkling at him.

"Ah, yes. It most certainly is," the man began, glad to have a pretense to slide into. He continued, "I was wondering..."

"Yes?" she said, looking interested. She had clearly expected him to say something.

"...Am I on the right train?"

The woman frowned. "This train is going to Corneria, after stopping by Hocotate and Hyrule. Didn't I tell you?"

Not that last bit about stopping at Hyrule. But the man kept that retort to himself. He reached into his pocket and scrounged around it, pulling out the dirty, folded up piece of paper he was looking at while waiting at the station not too long ago.

He unfolded the paper and showed it to her. "This is the timetable I was looking at."

The woman leaned forward to get a closer look. On the dirty sheet of paper was a list of the names of towns and cities, and another list of arrival and departure times sat in a box next to them. The letters were faded and hard to read, and the edges of the sheet were crinkled and crusty. After examining the timetable for a few moments, the woman located Altea on the list: one of the arrival times was listed as 03:15. She looked up from the sheet, frowning.

"How old is this timetable?" the woman asked.

"Six or seven years, I reckon."

The woman crossed her arms, watching the man fold up the paper and put it back in his pocket.

She pointed at the sheet in his pocket and said, "Well, then that explains your concern. That timetable is outdated. The schedule's changed quite a bit since then."

"I guessed that might have been the case," the man said, scratching the back of his head. "It seemed odd that the train would arrive five minutes late. There wouldn't seem to be any delays on this clear night - or rather, morning."

"You don't ride the train that often, do you? Any regular would have gotten an updated timetable from the nearest station every year or so," said the woman.

"You caught me there," said the man, flashing a smile at her. The first one today, she noticed.

The woman pouted her lips. She said somewhat haughtily, "So all that worrying you did was all for nothing. You got on the right train after all."

"I suppose. But if I didn't worry, we wouldn't have met, now would have we?" the man said.

The woman stared at the man and the foolishly smug expression he bore. She tried to pout for a bit longer but puttered out.

"Well, I suppose not. But! If I were to be completely honest, and it's not as though I would ever be, as being completely honest is nigh impossible without incurring some sort of haphazard inflection or lampshaded verisimilitude," the woman spluttered. She took a quick breath and continued on, this time in a clearer sort of babble, "I am rather glad with how things turned out, as the place would feel even more empty than it was as it were and time would have gone to waste if we had been sitting in different compartments without socializing with each other, due to the loss of having been able to engage in stimulating conversation such this, a rarity at this time in the morning."

The man blinked, feeling dazed. He thought he caught most of what he said, but he was uncertain whether or not those words actually linked together to form a comprehensible train of thought in his mind. Or in her mind, for that matter, as he saw that the woman looked as muddled as he was, split ends having popped up in her neatly brushed hair.

"But it wouldn't have been that big of a loss," continued the woman. "We would have met either way."

The man, though confused he was, managed to catch this bit crystal clear.

"'Either way'? What do you mean - " the man began to ask, only to be cut off by the sound of a piercing whistle.

The train's horn had sounded. The man looked through the window outside. There was nothing but fog that hid the trees and villages from sight in the valleys the train passed by. A few large beanstalks could be seen sprouting above the roof of the fog, indicating that the train had entered Hocotate territory. They had arrived at the first stop.

The two passengers stayed silent as the train pulled to a stop at the Hocotate station, listening to the screeching grinding of wheels on train tracks. The high-pitched sound made carrying any type of conversation simply impossible.

The sound of running footsteps muffled by the lush carriage carpet went unnoticed by the two passengers until a knock came at their door. The man and woman turned their heads simultaneously towards the glass door, where a man dressed in a conductor's uniform was heaving for breath. One of the buttons on his coat was missing.

"Pardon me for intruding, and my deepest apologies for not having come to check on you sooner," said the conductor with a gasp, as the man slid open the door. "I was on a break, and I lost track of the time."

The conductor pointed at his watch. The man and woman gazed at him with polite smiles and disinterested eyes. Clearly, the two of them thought the man had been napping on the job.

"I shall check your tickets now," said the conductor, motioning for the two of them to take their tickets out. "If you would please."

Some fumbling occurred as the two passengers scavenged around their belongings and paraphernalia for the needed ticket. The man found it relatively quickly inside one of his coat pockets. As he handed the ticket to the conductor, he heard the woman give a distressed exclamation; her handbag slid out of her lap, its contents spilling out onto the floor.

"Oh dear, how clumsy of me," the woman said, as she quickly picked up her rolling possessions.

The man bent down to help her while the conductor punched holes away at the ticket. He picked up a cylindrical pencil case and handed it to her.

"Thank you," said the woman with an appreciative smile. "An extra pair of hands are always helpful."

"It's not a problem."

He reached his arm across the floor to pick up a suggestive looking book with a picture of a woman carrying a child in her arms. It was titled, "Mother Love." The man paused to stare at it. When he realized that he was staring after a few seconds, the man quickly passed the book back to its owner.

The woman was distracted enough that she accepted the book back without much consideration.

"Thank you," she said absentmindedly, all of her bangs having fallen in front of her face. "Where is that ticket?"

The two of them continued to recollect her belongings until they found an orange sliver of paper hiding underneath a notebook. The woman let out another exclaimation - a triumphant one this time - before grabbing the ticket.

"Here you are," said the woman, handing it to the waiting conductor. "Sorry for the wait."

"Oh, no, it's completely fine, madam. I've got time to spare, and you two are the only passengers currently aboard, so..." the conductor told her, pausing to take a closer look at the ticket before punching it. "You came from the Mushroom Kingdom, madam? That's rather far."

"It is. I can assure you that it's been quite the journey," the woman said, smiling.

"I'm sure it has," replied the conductor, handing the ticket back to her. He tipped his hat to the two passengers. "Well, I must be getting back to my shift. Going to have to do some double time to make up for everything, really. If either of you need anything, feel free to give me a call, sir and madam."

The two passengers nodded and watched as the conductor excused himself from the room.

The man had his curiosity piqued by the recent events, if he hadn't been curious enough already. He opened his mouth to speak, but was stopped before he could utter a word.

"I've been riding this train for quite a while," said the woman abruptly. She brushed back her bangs and peered at him with those piercing blue eyes. "If I were to tell you that this is my first time venturing outside of the Mushroom Kingdom, would you believe me?"

"No, I would not," responded the man immediately. "You were the one that told me timetables for trains updated yearly."

"Yes, but that doesn't necessarily mean I ride the train that often," the woman said with a snide smile. "I never said I was a regular riding the train, myself."

The man thought back to that previous conversation. Yes, she didn't say that she was a part of that group herself, but the authoritative tone she used and her direct demanor led one to infer that she was.

"You caught me there," said the man, though without a smug smile this time. That went to the woman sitting in front of him - to the victor go the spoils.

"Looks like we're both neophytes on this trip. So, what are you on this train for, so early in the morning?" the woman asked with a grin.

"What am I here for? I need to visit some family," said the man.

"Ah. Family. I understand now."

"Yes. They're rather important," said the man. He rummaged around one of his inner suit pockets, and produced a greyscale photo. He handed it to her.

The woman took it into her hands gingerly, making sure to hold it by the edges so that she wouldn't accidentally smudge it. She saw a picture of a smiling woman sitting up in a hospital bed, her face creased with tired wrinkles. In her arms, wrapped in a blanket, was a sleeping, newborn baby. The woman in the photo had narrowed, joyful eyes of piercing turquoise.

"That's my wife, as you can guess. And the one she's holding is our son," explained the man.

The woman looked at the photo carefully. She said quietly, "She's beautiful. He's adorable..."

The man kept silent. Once the woman had finished looking at the photo, she handed it back to him.

"Congratulations. I assume this photo is relatively recent," the woman said. "So, are you going home to visit her now?"

"Thank you, and yes. She had him just last week," said the man, putting his head into his hands. "Although I wish I could have known about it sooner."

"Did something happen?"

"No, nothing bad, exactly. The letter was sent to my mailbox and arrived a week ago, but I couldn't have seen it due to me being out of town on a business trip for the past two weeks," the man croaked. "I forgot to have any letters sent to my business address for the trip. I only just found out about it after I got back earlier yesterday evening."

This explanation solved a lot of the woman's questions about the man's appearance. The tweed suit he was wearing was probably worn on the business trip, and the burberry coat a result of finding the nearest jacket he could grab. The tale also provided a reason for the man's odd lack of luggage. Not a single bag or suitcase could be found around him, aside from the woman's own. All he had with him was what was on his back and in his pockets.

"I'm sure it must have been tough, not knowing," said the woman in a soothing voice.

The woman paused to fiddle with her parasol. She was biting her lip again. The man kept his head in his hands, occasionally coursing them through his short hair.

The two jumped when they heard the sound of a horn blare. The train had reached its next stop: Hyrule. Both of them looked out the window, where there were no people waiting at the station. At four o'clock, the situation wasn't that much different as the one at three. Some customary procedures rolled out at the locomotive, such as fixing the engine and performing some quick check-ups with maintenance, before the train rolled out again, exiting the station within a matter of minutes.

Once the speed of the train started the pick up, the man began to talk.

"I've been meaning to ask something," said the man.

"Yes?"

"What did you mean earlier back before we reached Hocotate when you said, 'We would have met either way?'"

"Did I say that? I don't quite remember," the woman said innocently.

"Yes. Right before the horn sounded, signifying we had reached Hocotate station."

"I honestly don't remember. My apologies," said the woman.

The man frowned. "You really don't?"

The woman shook her head. The man noticed she wasn't fiddling with her parasol, indicating that she was probably not feigning.

"But, if I really did say that," the woman suddenly began. "Then I was probably thinking of the phrase, 'Hello is simply the beginning of goodbye.'"

"Come again?"

"'Hello is simply the beginning of goodbye,'" the woman repeated, speaking earnestly. "It's a phrase. Not exactly a proverbial one, mind you, but something of similar caliber, I think."

The man placed a hand on his forehead, feeling confused for the countless time that morning. "Please explain."

"I believe it means that we will always meet again," said the woman. "When we say goodbye, all it does is lead to another hello, and vice versa. Goodbye doesn't necessarily mean an end to a meeting, but rather it leads into something more."

"Like another meeting, perhaps," the man said.

"Yes," agreed the woman, nodding. She looked down for a moment, then snapped her head back up, gazing at the man piercingly. "I've become quite acquainted with that phrase, being a nurse and all."

The man raised his eyebrows a little. A nurse? He could imagine it, yes. She had a kindly disposition from what he knew of her and didn't seem the type to break under pressure easily. An independent sort of woman she was, though not without of all her womanly charms either. Her modest beauty was complemented by her simple yet dignified dress. She certainly seemed capable enough. He wouldn't have been that surprised if it weren't for the fact that she also seemed a little scatterbrained and clumsy. Even if it was 3 A.M. in the morning.

"Ah," said the man simply.

"Yes. I'm also on this trip with the intent of working as a nurse. I've been a nurse for twenty years now," said the woman.

The man gaped. To have been a nurse for twenty years, she must have been at least forty by now. But she was free of any wrinkles and looked as though to be in her twenties!

The man stuttered, "Twenty years? But you look so, so - "

" - So young?" the woman finished for him with a small laugh. "I get that a lot. My family is full of baby faces."

"It must be nice, having genetics like that," said the man with a hint of envy in his voice.

The woman waved a hand and shook her head. "It's not a blessing without its curses, unfortunately. I can't count the amount of times I've walked into a room and the patient batted their eyes at me, looking as though they thought I just came out of medical school."

"My - My bad," said the man. "But nowadays, don't nurses need to have some sort of experience before graduating?"

The woman's eyes lit up.

"Yes, yes, you get it!" said the woman, nodding eagerly. "Every nurse has to complete some practical training for at least a year or so before they can head out into the workforce."

Glad that he cheered the woman up, the man smiled sheepishly. "It's a bit disheartening how easily people can lose faith in others," he said.

The woman tilted her head a little in incomprehension. "Oh, I don't blame them for undermining me. It's easy to make such assumptions, and especially in a case like mine, where such assumptions are inevitable. I don't think I know anyone that wants a licensed surgeon without any experience to operate on them."

"I, er, think that's a different sort of case," said the man, gazing out the window for a moment.

Outside, he could see a herd of cows dot the fields around a Hyrulean village nestled within the valley. No doubt the cows were grazing on grass. He turned back to the woman.

"So, what did you mean earlier when you said you were acquainted with the phrase? The one about hellos and goodbyes," the man asked.

"Oh, that?" said the woman. "Well, as a nurse, you've got to be able to say hello and goodbye."

"To?" the man said, already having an inkling as to what the answer would be.

"Life and death, of course," said the woman matter-of-factly. "I've seen a lot of births and deaths, being a nurse."

"Ah... I suppose childbirths mean hello, while death is..."

"Goodbye. Yes. But there are exceptions. Childbirths usually mean hello, but not always," said the woman, her eyes downcast. "Deaths also have exceptions, but unlike childbirths, deaths are typically more certain in the type of greeting given."

She blinked, and looked up at the man. She tried to smile at him, but it came out looking as a painful sort of grimace.

"Thankfully, there have been plenty of cases where you don't always say goodbye at death, either. People are incredible beings, you know. They can often recover from the most fatal of wounds."

The woman paused. She had caught sight of a flying bird next to their window, but since it was flying in the opposite direction the train was going, she saw it only for a moment. She fixed her eyes back onto the man.

"I have seen a man return from the brink of death after having a near-fatal stroke," the woman continued. "And he wasn't the only one. There have been cases where people, declared to have been in a comatose state for years, suddenly revive in the middle of a night or when a family member was visiting."

"You've come in touch with life and death a lot in your life," said the man.

"Yes. Being a nurse - and a person - has made me realize just how priceless every moment of life really is, as well as the amount of possibilities there are to every situation... Was that a bit too clichéd?" the woman asked upon finishing.

"No, not at all. It's how you feel about it, and feelings are never clichéd," said the man, gazing at the woman softly with his piercing green eyes.

In a voice barely louder than a whisper, the man heard the woman say:

"Thank you..."

The man opened his mouth as if to say something, but was interrupted again when the blare of the train's horn sounded once more.

"Ah, there's the toot of the horn," said the woman suddenly, reaching under her seat to pull out her suitcase. "We've finally arrived at Corneria!"

For the fifth and final time that ride, the man looked out the window. A familiar set of jumbled structures loomed in the sky, rivaling the heights of the beanstalks found in Hocotate. The man could see the large, domed building sitting proudly atop a hill: the city's research lab of aerodynamics. Not long would there be before the first flying machine would be finished and created. It was a sight the man was new to seeing, despite having been a part of that sight for a good part of his life. How interesting a new perspective could put a spin on things, the man thought.

* * *

The sounds of wheels rolling on top of an uneven, cobblestone surface and two sets of footsteps were muted when two people paused by the exit of the station. The man had walked with the woman to the exit, and now, both turned to each other to share the final one of their conversations.

The woman, pulling her handbag higher up her shoulder, looked at the man with her piercing blue eyes and said:

"Well, I suppose that this means goodbye."

"Yes, I suppose it does. But before we part, I do have one last question," said the man.

"Of course. But I hope it's not a difficult one," said the woman with a smile. "Or anything involving mushrooms. People always ask me that, thinking I'm also a toxicologist."

The man chuckled. " Don't worry. It's a simple one. Why are you here as a nurse, may I ask?"

"That's easy enough," said the woman, letting out a satisfied sigh. "I'm here to work with some family relations."

The man fought back from releasing a grin. His initial impression of her was right on the mark; she was visiting some of her family, after all! He felt glad that the two of them had the same goals in mind. It made him feel as though the two of them were kindred spirits, if only temporarily, for the train ride.

"Oh, really?" the man said. "Well then, I hope that everything goes well for you."

The woman beamed at him.

"Oh, I'm sure they will. Since I'm meeting yours," said the woman.

The man blinked. His family? She couldn't mean...

"Didn't you guess? I'm the newly hired nurse - nanny - that has come to help take care of your baby!" declared the woman, whipping out the exact same photo he showed her while aboard the train. A photo of a woman with turquoise eyes holding a beautiful baby.

The man blinked again.

He looked up from the photo up at the person holding it, and found himself face-to-face with a pair of eyes he was already all too familiar with. A set of piercing, warm blue eyes not unlike his own.

The woman smiled and put the photo back into her handbag.

"Now, don't you see? The meaning of when I said, 'Hello is the simply the beginning of goodbye?'" she told him.

The man blinked for the third time. So the woman was feigning when she said she did not remember saying that they would be meeting again. He didn't have to wonder why. He would have liked to know, but knowing it outright probably would have just jittered him more while waiting on the train. He thought he had been a good judge of character. In that sense, he was sorely outclassed, but that wasn't necessarily a bad thing.

The man had but just two words to say. With a radiant, infectious smile, he said to her:

"Hello, again."

* * *

A/N: "Hello is simply the beginning of goodbye." Not sure if I got the quotation word for word, but a phrase like that was said by the rematchable trainer Lady Cindy in Pokémon Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald. You could interpret it in such a variety of ways. The phrase really resonated with me, and was probably the inspiration of this piece. So thanks to the writers of those games for a lovely line.


End file.
